Saturday, 29 September 2012

Father
Basil Jellicoe (1899 – 1935) was a clergyman in the Church of England, a
housing reformer best known for his housing work, which started when he was a
Missioner at the Magdalen Mission in Somers Town, London.

Somers Town street

It was
here, west of the British Library, that Jellicoe founded the St
Pancras House Improvement Society (as it was originally known) and several
other housing associations in London, Sussex and Cornwall.

Somers
Town is the area between the three mainline north London railway termini:
Euston (1838), St Pancras (1868) and Kings Cross (1852, together with the
Midland Railway Somers Town Goods Depot (1887) next to St Pancras, where the
British Library now stands.

St Pancras Railway Station

When I
was visiting my mother at St Pancras Hospital I would walk up through the
Somers Town housing estate, past Old St Pancras Churchyard where Mary Shelley
was originally buried, and where the Hardy Tree is to be found ...

... in
the mid 1860s, the young Thomas Hardy was in charge of the excavation of part
of the graveyard, in the course of the construction of the Midland Railway’s
London terminus, he placed the gravestones around the sapling – now known as
the Hardy Tree.

Thomas Hardy tree, Old St Pancras churchyard

Mary
Wollstonecraft, William Godwin, their daughter Mary Shelley, the architect Sir
John Soane, and Charles Dickens, as a child, amongst others have lived within the
auspices of Somers Town.

Over
the years from the late 1780s when the first housing appealed to middle class
people fleeing the French Revolution, new housing continued to be built amongst
the fields, brick works and market gardens on the northern fringes of 1780s
London, marking Somers Town (pre the railways) as a good neighbourhood.

Within
a hundred years the houses were multiple occupation, and overcrowding was
severe with whole families sometimes living in one room, as confirmed by the
social surveys of Charles Booth and Irene Barclay.

Jellicoe’s
St Pancras and Humanist Housing Association wanted to prove that the poorest
tenants could live in good quality homes: where the properties were more than
just housing ... there could be plenty of outside space for gardening, leisure,
works of art and sculpture.

The
sculptor Gilbert Bayes (1872 – 1953) is remembered for his interest in colour,
his association with the Royal Doulton Company, and his work in polychrome
ceramics and enamelled bronze.

Bayes
was commissioned to decorate the courtyards and gardens in the new housing
developments being created in the 1930s.
Bayes and Jellicoe were inspired by folklore, the Bible and medieval
romances ... so many of the streets are named after saints, and any sculptures
and art works reflected these interests.

Ceramic
finials were created by Bayes to decorate the top of washing-line posts ... and
the British Library had allocated a tiny (well large pillar base!) plinth to remind us of the Humanist Housing
Association’s aspirations of the 1930s for their community housing – this, I
found, near the British Library’s cloakrooms!

Here I
found my inspiration for this post to remind us of days gone by ... Somers Town
cut through by the railways, 20th and 21st century roads and
developments ... the new St Pancras International station is here ...

... yet
being remembered for the fine New Sculpture movement sculptures that
tied in with the changes being encountered through the Art Nouveau period and
enlightened thinkers of the early 1900s.

Jellicoe
and his associates wanted the slum housing conditions to be improved, and ... if
suitably desirable ... then perhaps the residents would take greater care of
their properties and area.

The 20th
century saw other changes in Somers Town, some good some bad – as is to be
expected, now with our more ‘enlightened’ approach to life Somers Town has
retained its diverse cultural communities.

Dolphin Pub in Somers Town

Jellicoe’s
concern for social improvement in housing and living conditions, while his
connections with philanthropic patrons and artists during his life, enabled an
area of London to develop a uniqueness that we see today in the district ...

... and
one that is fortunately available to us via a minute display that I found
downstairs at the British Library with extra information via modern technology
that is the internet.

Tuesday, 25 September 2012

Banner
high – the Perennial Lupin with its bumblebee – invites all visitors to the
British Museum to explore the North American landscape ... without leaving
central London.

British Museum's banner

Silly
me – goes in to the Museum and asks where’s the display – outside they
say!! So outside I go – and yes the
‘flower bed’ in front of the Museum has been planted up as a trail through the
Florida swamps, the Missouri prairie to the forests of New England and Canada.

For the
past five years the Royal Botanical Society, Kew have teamed up with the
British Museum to create a landscape on the Museum’s West Lawn (I see that’s
what it is called!) ....

....
bringing Kew into the heart of London – and by wandering through the landscape,
visitors can discover more about the relationships between humans and plants –
from Native North Americans and new world encounters to modern conservation
projects.

British Museum as the backdrop to the North Americanlandscape on the west lawn

Each of
the planting areas was labelled up, the plants marked, and the areas were given
brief annotations ... while the landscapes have been themed to complement the
public programmes at the British Museum and Kew.

So far
the habitats of China, India, South Africa and Australia have been celebrated
in these annual partnership programmes – combining demonstrations, talks,
lectures and study sessions – supplemented with videos, a slideshow of the star
plants and the general pleasure of finding a landscape vista on the Museum’s
West Lawn.

Perhaps
next year I can go up and see the next landscape and follow it through the
seasons – its early planting, to summer flowering, to the autumnal glow, before
the plants fade into their winter dormancy.

I was
at the Museum to see two other exhibitions ... but I think I need to go back to
visit the North American Galleries to see some of the native peoples’ close
relationship with the landscape and its vegetation, which contributed so much to
early European understanding of botany and natural history.

Black Walnut

Kew’s
Millennium Seed Bank (worldwide) is working in partnership with organisations
in Canada and the USA via the Seeds of
Success programme to address threats to habitats and support the
re-establishment of plants and eco-systems at risk.

Paper Birch tree

Native
seeds are collected and stored in seed banks in locations in North America,
with duplicate collections held at Wakehurst Place – Kew’s country garden where
the Millennium Seed Bank is housed.

Sweet Grass

The
American organisations involved are: Bureau of Land Management; Lady Bird
Johnson Wildflower Center; Chicago Botanic Garden; Zoological Society of San
Diego; North Carolina Botanic Garden and New England Wildflower Society; while
in Canada it is the Devonian Botanic Garden in Edmonton, Alberta.

The
British Museum’s press release highlights:

·Sweet grass (Hierchloe odorata) – that is used
as incense because of its vanilla scent and is sacred to many of the indigenous
peoples of North America, who believe smoke from burning dried sweet grass
welcomes in good spirits.

Many of the grasses’ natural
habitats of wet meadows, lake-shores, stream banks and low prairies have been
lost ... so the plant is now endangered.

·Orange coneflower (Rudbeckia fulgida) is a
member of the daisy family and is a prairie wildflower that thrives in open
woods, meadows and pastures.

This species was first
described in England in 1789 by William Aiton (1731 – 1793), the first curator
of Kew Gardens, in his catalogue of plants cultivated at Kew (Hortus Kewensis). Loss of habitat means this species is now
becoming endangered.

·Paper Bark tree was used by Native Americans to
collect the sugary sap from trees like the Silver Maple, or the beautiful
souvenirs made by Native women from the bark for trading.

With
the diversity of peoples we have in London, and those visiting each year, these
landscape projects give everyone an opportunity to remember how diverse our
planet is, yet remind ourselves that natural vegetation is under threat and many
plant species face extinction ...

... by
spreading the word, much as Kew and other botanic organisations are attempting
to maintain the status quo of our natural vegetation, we can remind ourselves
and others of the importance of our natural habitat and learn to protect it.

Echinacea

Let’s
join together and help raise awareness of the importance of each of the world’s
eco-systems and their absolute necessity to this life of ours, especially those
locally around us ...

Having
the Olympics in London gave the BBC a huge opportunity to showcase their work
to the world, yet we, the audience, had a huge expectation ...

... we
would want to have the possibility to watch every venue (40+), every event
start to finish, every session, every sport, every aspect, every day – so not a
moment could be missed ...

...
they had all the strands of the Beeb to consider – Radio, TV, World Service,
local tv stations too – then the 24 digital streams going out with 2,500 hours
of coverage – at Sydney ... the BBC only had 300 hours of coverage on BBC 1 and
2 ....

.... here
they also had to make arrangements with Sky, Virgin and the Beeb Facebook page
... there was BBC Twitter (which was monitored 24/7) ...

... of
course they had to stick to programme listings ... and there were the big
screens around the country, allowing the community to come together during the
Games, torch ceremonies, etc etc

Then we
need to remember the other events that were going on around Britain during this
year, the different audiences who needed to be catered for – Children’s TV
(CBBC), local tv and radio stations ...

CBBC Website

CBBC
had its own website, children’s story recording, the torch route, Blue Peter
(the flagship children’s tv programme) ...

The
Torch Relay was broadcast from a converted horsebox, which followed the torch all the way around its 70
day route ... 8,000 miles, 66 evening celebrations ... and more.

Torch Relay Horsebox - BBC

The
Cultural Olympiad and London 2012 Festival ...
what an array of artistic, musical, architectural, literary et al events
– the “Pentathlon of the Muses” ...
all needing to be taken into account in the scheduling.

Then
there’s the normal BBC scheduling of their regular programmes that needed to be
taken into account.

The BBC
Proms had to be catered for ... the annual 8 week (mid July – mid Sept) Promenade
Concerts predominantly at the Albert Hall, but with events being staged around
Britain – including tie-ins with the Olympic theme.

Now I’m
re-reading this ... what an amazing quantity of broadcast coverage ... standard
broadcasting, digital opportunities, not forgetting radio, nor more importantly
the social media aspects, journalists working in the field ...

...
then there’s the technology we expect now – all the interactivity ... the
‘extra’ slots, the ‘see it again/play it again’, the alarm calls for specific
events, all the stats ...

Adding Cables

And I
don’t understand that last paragraph at all really!I hear the word “smart” bandied around ...
and I guess that’s what technology is ... who does the glueing I’ve no idea!!

The
International Broadcast Centre at the Park was the size of 5 jumbo jets and is
provided by the host broadcaster, whose parameters are set by the International
Olympic organisation to ensure there is neutral coverage of all events for all
broadcasters, which the BBC then customised its coverage for the British audience.

International Broadcasting Centre in
June 2011

The BBC
is decentralising from London and BBC Sport was one of the departments
scheduled to move .... conveniently this happened in the 2012 summer!?

The
heart of the BBC Sports’ web operation, Olympics news coverage and distribution
was now located in the north of England at the new MediaCityUK in Salford (just
outside Manchester).

MediaCityUK

Still
the BBC Olympic Studios had to be at the Olympic Park ... so they hired 18 reusable
shipping containers at a cost of £2.50 per day!! This had been tried out for the Football
World Cup 2010 in Cape Town – so the BBC reused that studio, customising it as
necessary.

Radio 2
also broadcast from one of the containers ...

c/o The Metro - Lund Point and the
unfinished Olympic Park in 2011

The BBC
rented vacant areas of the top five floors of the 22 storey tower block, Lund
Point, with views across east London and into the Park as a base for their
Olympic and Paralympic coverage:

... BBC
News and the BBC World Service used this space ... they built a studio on the
roof, accessible via laddered scaffolding, to which ‘everyone’ climbed!

There
were commentators at every sport – whose commentary and feeds were available for other countries to tap into
...

Each
day the BBC1 was allocated to the Olympics and its events ... BBC3 opened at
9.00 am (instead of 7.00pm) – all the BBC Parliament bandwidth was transferred
to the BBC3 transmission.

White Water Canoeing at Lee Valley

A
nation was united: 28.7 m of us watched
the opening ceremony, 27.3m of us watched the closing ceremony ... their target
audience for Beijing was 75%, this year the target was 85%, but 91% was
reached.

They
took stats of everything, and are still evaluating those ... fully researched
...

The
advent of Digital gives us, the audience, (seemingly) a never ending choice ...
as well as High-Definition Television (HDTV) providing a resolution that is
substantially higher than standard ...

Hadleigh Farm in Essex - Mountain Biking

... to
which we’d all been subscribed to in the digital roll-out, the south-east being
the final region in May of this year – new tvs or converter boxes being
required ... and retuning, while it was all fine tuned. I only use the basic tv set up – so am not
aware of all the ‘goodies’ available – I’ll get there!!

Then
Dave Gordon gave us an idea of the future for TV ... in about 20 years a much
more interactive system, when the resolution would be sixteen times greater
than today – Super Hi Vision tv screenings would be wall size.

BBC boxes!

The BBC
had to work with all organisations to ensure they meet their public service
charter ... so BBC Sport is looking at the lessons learnt from the Olympics and
readying up for the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow 2014 ...

...
they thought they might have 3,000 schools participating in the Olympic
coverage – but it was 5,000 schools from around the world ...

The IOC
has a Youth Olympics every four years (winter and summer) following the style
of the Olympic Games ... the next one will be in 2014.

After
Sydney 2000 there was a pile of letters to answer ... at London 2012 the BBC
receive instantaneous feedback and need to react accordingly ...

Portland, Dorset - Olympic Sailing venue

They
have social scientists on board to monitor, help with planning, scheduling and generally
study society and human behaviour ... so improvements can be introduced.

The BBC
had first call at the London Olympics, but usually get preferential treatment
at Olympic Games due to the BBC’s worldwide coverage ... there is a lot of give
and take amongst broadcasters during these international events – there is very
little in-fighting.

The BBC
is a broadcaster ... not a narrowcaster – and for the not so popular events
they would include extra coverage within other programmes: the sport would get
coverage, yet the probably tiny audience would have a sampling of the British
aspects to the sport, but the sport and its successes would be highlighted
elsewhere – eg in the One Show, or on Breakfast TV ...

Olympic Village

During
the Olympic and Paralympic Games – the newly gained British expertise was being
tapped into by the Brazilian authorities – for their Olympics in 2016 and the
2014 football World Cup ... and the BBC would be at the forefront broadcasting
these events to its UK and global audiences.

Looking
back on the talk and giving myself a better idea of the challenges the BBC and
broadcasters face – it has opened my eyes as to how much is involved in just
getting the sport into our sitting rooms, cars, mobile phones, high streets etc
... and the BBC costs us just 40p a day for all the pleasure and information it
gives us. There are no adverts - bliss!

BBC
Sport covers a vast array of events, is constantly evaluating itself, has a
global scrutiny going on – for the Olympics by the IOC, other events by the
various sporting bodies - the BBC values
its position in global broadcasting ... while the British public have a first
rate reputable broadcaster ... which cannot allow itself to be seen as biased
in any way.

Look at what can be achieved with a few boxes!

The
logistics of it all is immense ... the technicians, the electricians, the
camera crews, the artistes, the journalists, backroom boffins and
administrators, the actual broadcasting – all has to be assembled, co-ordinated,
scheduled ...

... and
that was just BBC Sport ...

This is
a piecemeal post – but gives an overview of what goes on behind the scenes in
getting any sporting event broadcast ... it was an interesting British Library
event ...

Thursday, 20 September 2012

Jurassic
music along the coast of Dorset ... the wind chimes across the cliffs from 180
million years ago ... another 2012 Cultural Olympiad Festival installation ...

Instruments across Dorset's rolling hills

More
than 500 instruments were set up by the French composer Pierre Sauvageot, to be
played by the wind ... the one mile stretch of Harmonic Fields overlooked the
Olympic sailing course of Weymouth Bay and Portland Harbour.

A musical walk through a pergola

The
instruments were suspended on posts along the coastal path in Dorset, in six
different locations ... as Mr Sauvageot said “The Dorset Coast is a wonderful
place to bring Harmonic Fields – its rolling hills and wide seascape the
perfect place for the audience to immerse themselves in their sounds ....”

Portland Harbour - the Olympic's sailingvenue - the Clubhouse is on the far left

The audience could sit and listen, walk slowly
along the cliff path, or occasionally stop and put a hat on – a musical
instrument to hear the sound - as wind flows create these incredible free sounds
of nature.

The 500
instruments were set out in the form of six music movements at the different
locations:

on the landscape

at the seaside

along the cliff top

down into the valley

on the dunes

finishing in the disused Bowers quarry

·

Cliff top seascape

The
event was only staged for six days ... and I’ve only just read about it, while
researching something else to post ... but this one steals the show.

Quite
extraordinary I thought – and now what else have I missed from the Cultural
Olympiad this summer?! But I know many
of you will be interested to read about them ... and I’ve linked the BBC sites
below, also other YouTube links for overseas readers ...

Steampunk
is a genre that incorporates elements of science fiction, fantasy, alternate
history, horror and speculative fiction – it is a right melting pot of
technology, art fashion and design - no
wonder I had trouble understanding this genre?!

This
Festival of Flame sure showed us recycled parts ... it was like Da Vinci’s
machines being automated with gears ... cranking around the stadium ...

The
Times’ newspaper gave me a breakdown of ‘Behind the Story’ – where it describes
these fantaristic machines ... a motorcade as an ode to recycling ...

...
component parts fished out of the sea, dug for in scrapheaps and salvaged from
Devon beaches. Each truck was a hodgepodge
of different bits of “rubbish” with long backstories, welded together:

Clocks truck – a 20 metre crane arm s the clock hand, this
truck was made out of an old fire engine.
Its creators took inspiration from Isambard Brunel, Chaplin’s Modern Times, industrialisation and
Steampunk Victoriana (a la Jules Verne);

Clamposaurus – A hydraulic dinosaur, his body made of 25
BMW frames welded together, his teeth and head from agricultural machinery, and
his tail was a slashed tractor tyre.

Grasshopper – this was made out of aeroplane parts: the
back legs were a pair of glider fuselages, the wings were those of several
light aircraft, and the head was made out of a Gazelle helicopter embedded with
a trampoline.

Fish - An East German army truck rescued after the
Cold War and debris from the Devon coastline were adorned with 600
graffiti-sprayed hub caps by 120 school children, selected from the Olympic
host boroughs.

Steamship – A ship cobbled together out of old parchment
maps, a bicycle chain for a bowsprit, a telescopic mast made out of an army
radar system, and wrought iron salvaged from the burnt-out west pier in
Brighton.

The
Closing Ceremony paid homage to the eccentricities of the Britain – we had crop
circles ... the Monty Python-esque parade of Mad Max style vehicles ... the
music and songs by Cold Play evocating the steampunk madness of the evening ...

... yet
celebrating the achievements of any disabled performer in their ability to
adapt, manipulate, meld, make-do ... and all the while achieve by moving inexorably towards their goal ...

A - Z Banner

About Me

A lover of life – who after London, spent time in South Africa; an administrator, sports lover, who enjoys cooking and entertaining ... who through her mother’s illness found a new passion – writing, in particular blogging; which provides an opportunity for future exploration, by the daughter, who has (in her 3rd age years) found a love of historical education. Curiosity didn’t kill this cat – interaction is the key!